Brett Hutton's eight-wicket haul completes Northants' victory

Northamptonshire 282 (Procter 70, Levi 63, Duckett 52, Taylor 4-70) and 32 for 0 beat Gloucestershire 62 (Sanderson 5-16) and 250 (Higgins 63, Hutton 8-57) by 10 wickets
Scorecard

Northamptonshire took just 32 minutes on the third day to wrap up a 10-wicket victory over Gloucestershire at Wantage Road to claim their first win in the Specsavers County Championship this season.

Having resisted on the second evening to take the game into day three, Gloucestershire could last only another 17 balls to be bowled out for 250, leaving a target of only 31 that Ben Duckett knocked off himself in just four overs.

Brett Hutton removed the final two wickets within three balls to finish with 8 for 57 - the third-best figures for Northants this century.

"We've played very well this week, we've been disappointed in the Championship so far but we showed if we play somewhere near our best cricket we're capable of winning games.

"Ben and Brett will take the headlines but the whole attack did their bit and added to the pressure and they never got away from us," head coach David Ripley said. "We took the majority of our catches as well, the surface offered a bit more carry which brought the cordon into play so a great effort from the groundsman as well.

"We need to back up this performance now at Cardiff and it's about building the confidence up and we can take that into the T20s too."

Matt Taylor only added a single to his overnight 37 before pushing at a length ball and edging to second slip where Richard Levi dived to his right to take a sharp catch. No. 11 Chris Liddle then lost his off stump for a duck leaving Craig Miles stranded on 38 not out.

The chase was over very quickly as Duckett played an emphatic extra-cover drive off Miles, a flick through midwicket and two top-edged pulls over the wicketkeeper's head. Another pull off Miles took Northants to within one hit of victory before an outside edge found the third man fence to complete the win.

Northants, who took 21 points from the match, now head to Glamorgan on Monday while Gloucestershire are left to concentrate on the T20 Blast that begins in two weeks.

Gloucestershire head coach said: "We've been outplayed, and it's more to do with the ball - it wasn't a 280 wicket. We didn't exert any pressure with the ball, we bowled two sides of the wicket and the wrong length.

"We were a bit more up for the fight in the second innings but day one we were behind the eight ball and couldn't recover from that.

"We've got the T20 coming up but also the Cheltenham festival and we want to be playing some good cricket in the Championship there so by no means will we just be focussing on T20."